Reading those substantial discussions taking place in this great site, I realized that there may be two sides in studying any foreign language.One is of course the proper study like you do at school. The other is, you know, the ordinary conversation that you don't necessarily have to care about those grammatical accuracies.Don't get me wrong. I'm not wanting to discuss about those coarse and vulgar languages you may find on street. But take the official qualification tests for language learners for instance. There are bunch of words and expressions that nobody uses in our daily life. I understand the necessity of acquiring them. Believe it or not, I myself have been studying this kind of English for many many years. I found many total bilingual people here and just for your imformation, I got 985 points at the TOEIC test last year, which seems to be concidered to be a relatively high score amongst normal Japanese. But I always feel uncomfortable and embarrassing when I speak in English. In other words, that score doesn't mean anything to me. I personally believe that the capacity for the ordinary conversation that no tests can evaluate would be the most challenging part of acquiring a foreign language.

I'll suggest some other ways to write your sentences so it's more clear:

Reading those substantial discussions taking place in this great site, I realized that there may be two sides in studying any foreign language."After reading the substantial discussions taking place on..."

The other is, you know, the ordinary conversation that you don't necessarily have to care about those grammatical accuracies."...the ordinary conversations where you don't necessarily need to worry about proper grammar."

Don't get me wrong. I'm not wanting to discuss about those coarse and vulgar languages you may find on street. "Don't get me wrong, I don't want to speak in the coarse and vulgar language you may find on the street"

There are bunch of words and expressions that nobody uses in our daily life."...that nobody uses in their daily life"

I found many total bilingual people here and just for your imformation, I got 985 points at the TOEIC test last year, which seems to be concidered to be a relatively high score amongst normal Japanese. "I found many bilingual here and just for your information, I got 985 points on the TOEIC, which seems to be considered a relatively high score amongst normal Japanese speakers"

But I always feel uncomfortable and embarrassing when I speak in English. "...and embarrassed..."

In other words, that score doesn't mean anything to me. "But that score doesn't mean anything to me."

I personally believe that the capacity for the ordinary conversation that no tests can evaluate would be the most challenging part of acquiring a foreign language."I personally believe that no test can evaluate what would be the most challenging part of acquiring a foreign language; ordinary conversation."

"In other words" should only be used when you're saying something you already said, except with different words.

NileCat wrote:Thank you very much for your comment, Eiuol.It means a lot to me.Your corrections are wonderful and very helpful.

I need to study it more harder.Please help me out some times if you don't mind.

Thanks a million !

"I need to study it more." or "I need to study it harder." Saying "more harder" is redundant and incorrect.

As for the next sentence, there might better ways to say it... first, "sometimes" should be one word. You could also say something like "Please help me out in the future if you don't mind.", but just "Please help me out sometimes if you don't mind." is acceptable as well.

I think the difference is that "please help me out in the future" sounds like more "please continue to help me", whereas "please help me out sometimes" means to only help once in awhile. Periodically. So the first way sounds more like you would like to be helped any time you need it rather than only sometimes. I hope this makes sense.

Also, I wanted to say that I generally agree with what you were saying in your original post. You will very rarely see actual conversational language covered in textbooks. We talk about it in the chat from time to time where in English conversation you would be more likely to respond "yeah" instead of "yes" in an informal setting. Or maybe things like saying "hey" or "hi" instead of "hello" etc. I'm sure others have some better examples of English expressions that you would commonly see in conversation but not in textbooks.

Hello Nilecat! Welcome to TJP and thanks for all your help already. I think you'll become a valuable member of this forum.

As for your question, I think it depends on the method of study. If you study entirely or mostly from textbooks, or for the purpose of passing a test, then you'll be better at formal language, and probably have difficulty with casual idiomatic language even if you have a large vocabulary. However, if you learn by immersion and casual conversation with the people around you everyday you'll naturally become good at that type of language.

For me, I studied Japanese for four years at university, then moved to Japan where I've been living for the past nine years. I have a lot of Japanese friends so I have no trouble with casual language, but I rarely write anything by hand, so my kanji writing is severely lacking.

Thanks for your comment, Becki.Well... For I suppose you are one of the founders of this wonderful site, I'd like to ask you something.And, because it seems very important to me, please forgive my writing in Japanese. I'd like to avoid misunderstandings and unfortunately it's beyond my ability of English.

I've just finished reading all the comments posted in the trees coco indicated.Unlike most of you, I can't blame them nor laugh at them.As I wrote before, I'm studying English. And I have no idea how my English sounds, to be honest.For instance,

If you think it would embarrass your grandma, don't put it here.

I totally understand the idea and agree with it.But, well... no offense, I have never had grandma who speaks English in my life.I am even not sure if the word 'grandma' is polite enough rather than saying 'grandmother'.When I was young, I studied English very hard only to get good scores at school. Believe it or not, I was good with that. But I hadn't spoken with any native English speakers except for only few teachers untill I got 25. And years after that, it was only a couple of years ago when I made up my mind to restart studying it, properly, this time.I started watching news programs like many English lerners. Then TVs and films. I clearly remember the first wall I hit, which was colloquialism. Have you ever seen a film called 'An Incovenient Truth' ? That was not too tough to understand because Mr.Former Vice President spoke very properly, of course. But right after seeing that, I watched the film called 'Juno'. It was a good film describing a life of a high school girl. And, you know, I couldn't make heads or tails of it, which made me very sad.

I'm still wondering how I can improve my English.That's the reason why I'm here now.

But I'm afraid you wouldn't have made out what I wanted to say, because of my poor English.You can differentiate the way of speaking of a 70-year-old granma who has a strong dialect of Aomori or a 11-year-old geek boy who doesn't behave himself from other people's 'proper' ways of speaking.Why are you able to do that?That's because you possess the enough knowledge about those inappropriate ways of speaking.You can't just say "you don't need to know".

I'm sorry if it sounded rude.I just wanted to make myself clear, for my own sake.Actually, your wonderful opinions gave me a good opportunity to think over this interesting issue.Thank you.

This is what coco-san kindly created for me with a serious intention, which seems very well done to me.If anyone would translate it for me into English as it is, I would highly appreciate it.And if you think it's inappropriate to post it here, just PM to me please.